Now is the time: MIH General Managers Conference review

The Master Innholders Hotel General Managers Conference 2019 was
hosted at the Intercontinental Hotel - The O2 on January 28 and
29. More than 450 industry professionals gathered at the
event, which was themed "now is the time".

With this in mind, Danny Pecorelli FIH MI, Master Innholders
chairman, opened the conference by saying: "Never has there been
such time for change in our industry. Our customers and our
workforce are changing and maybe our government is changing, so our
industry needs to change."

This message was paramount to the conference and reflected by
Kate Nicholls, CEO of UKHospitality, in her speech. With the
hospitality sector being hit by the uncertainty of Brexit-fuelled
inflation, rising regulatory costs and soaring rates and rents,
Nicholls offered advice on how the hospitality sector can tackle
the uncertain times ahead. She also weighed in on whether we're
through the worst of the perils and pitfalls on the political road
and the impact it may have on business competitiveness and
productivity.

Addressing the conference attendees, Nicholls defined the role
of UKHospitality: "We are your trade body, we're there to be your
voice, your champion and to get the environment that we need to
continue to grow."

She went onto explain how UKHospitality aims to help those
working in the industry to flourish: "Our vision is of a dynamic,
innovative and vibrant sector at the heart of everyday great
experiences that are important culturally, economically and
socially."

This statement came after Nicholls acknowledged the difficult
times the hospitality industry had endured, but expressed her
optimism for the future. This is largely down to the hospitality
industry being the third largest private sector employer, something
that has given the industry political leverage to progress.

When discussing her vision for the hospitality sector to improve
the reputation of the industry, she added: "That is what we've
really driven home to government over the course of this last year
where we've been merged as one body."

The hospitality sector has generated £130 billion worth of
turnover, employed 3.2 million people in highly skilled and highly
valued jobs with prospects for career progression and generated one
in eight of net new jobs last year.

Nicholls and her team are also working to reduce the unnecessary
costs of doing business, and create a market place which treats and
taxes all entrepreneurs and all businesses equally. She said: "Our
core objectives and what my team is doing is first and foremost to
promote the reputation of the sector as a great place to work and
actively engage in finding solutions to the challenges that we face
collectively today."

In 2018, this work bore fruit as the government backed the
industry for the first time with the Tourism and Hospitality sector
deal, one of only six industrial sectors across the whole economy
that the government has supported.

Nicholls said this decision is symbolically important as it
sends a clear message that the government recognises the importance
of this sector of the economy in terms of careers. The government
will also be supporting the hospitality sector by endorsing a three
year recruitment campaign to get the best talent into the sector
and endorsing the industry as a career of choice.

Brexit has recently been dominating a lot of
Nicholls' time - she has been working with ministers to secure a
food supply in the event of a no-deal Brexit. She has also been
asking: "How do we ensure we have the labour that we need to
deliver the high quality hospitality experiences that the rest of
the economy depends upon?"

It is a message that Nicholls says she has ensured ministers
understand and appreciate. She said: "We've been working on
ensuring that the immigration deal meets the needs of our industry.
UKHospitality have succeeded in getting ministers to drop the
£30,000 minimum salary threshold on immigrants coming to the UK
after December 31st 2020 and it is now being negotiated and have
advised the salary requirement will be lower. The settled status
fee for EU citizens arriving in the UK before December 31st 2020
has been scrapped as a result of the hard work from the hospitality
sector."

On the second day of the event, Ian Millar, senior lecturer at
École hôtelière de Lausanne, took to the stage to talk about the
top technology trends to look out for in the near future and the
ones to avoid.

Firstly, Millar addressed the technology that he believes is
over-hyped. These include 8K TV - that Millar said will take five
to ten years to become remotely relevant, mobile apps for hotels -
that are very expensive and require constant maintenance - and
mobile keys that can create serious security concerns.

Millar also dismissed rumours that robots will take over the
industry, telling of how a Japanese hotel sacked 250 robots because
they were unable to maintain them.

When discussing the innovations that will be making a impact on
the hospitality industry, Millar pointed towards guests being given
the opportunity to cast their own content onto hotel TVs.
"We're living in a Netflix world," Millar stated and with Netflix
generating 50 per cent of all internet traffic worldwide, guests'
own content is sure to become a recognisable feature in hotels.

Guest messaging is also becoming increasingly popular in the
hospitality industry, with 40 to 50 per cent of start-ups using
messaging platforms such as Whatsapp to allow guests to interact
with hotel staff.

Other technology trends Millar suggests will be breaking ground
in the future include facial recognition - although Millar reckons
this is more relevant to business hotels with more than 300 rooms -
sentiment analysis and 5G wifi.

Alongside the talks guests also attended the annual gala dinner
and a champagne reception at the Intercontinental London - The O2
on the evening of Monday 28th January. They also took part in a
raffle that raised £8,000 for the Master Innholders Charitable
Trust, Springboard and Hospitality Action.